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glossolalia

Greek for ‘speaking in tongues’, one of the gifts to the Church in Paul's list (1 Cor. 12: 10) but scarcely encouraged by him (1 Cor. 14: 23) and not mentioned at all in another list (Rom. 12: 6–8). It may be the phenomenon at Pentecost (Acts 2: 4) when those in the upper room are said in a reversal of the confusion at Babel (Gen. 11: 1–9) to have uttered understandable foreign languages. There are indeed records of similar surprises later in the Church (e.g.
among persecuted Huguenots in France) and among Muslims. When, however, linguistic experts have been able to tape-record speakers
alleged to be uttering a new language in a state of religious enthusiasm, it has never been possible to identify the language
or discern any grammar or structure.